Kurt Helin

Is Jimmer Fredette the Tim Tebow of the NBA? Interesting question. Both were huge college stars with questions about how their games would translate to the next level. Both have a religious aspect to their popularity. Both are locked out right now. Tebow and Fredette also both are at the American Century Championships this weekend,…

Kobe Bryant on his annual tour through Asia, promoting the game, himself and selling some Nike shoes along the way. And he’s the biggest NBA star in Asia because he has been doing this for years. How much do they love him in the Philippines? Watch the video below. Kobe laced them up for an…

Among the many things that needed to right for the Dallas Mavericks to win their first ever NBA title, they needed to stay healthy. And while that is true of every team, with an older team the odds of problems go up. So, the Mavericks players got cold. During their playoff run, a number of…

Seems like every day one or more NBA players say they are open to the idea of playing overseas during the NBA lockout. While we have our doubts about how many will actually go (even if the lockout drags into the season), here’s a roundup of who is saying and doing what in the last…

Apparently they will be seeing more of Maria Sharapova in Istanbul. Her fiancé, former Laker and Net Sasha Vujacic, has signed a deal to play for traditional Turkish League power Anadolu Efes, according to the official site of the EuroLeague. This had been rumored and is not a surprise. It’s a good get for a…

Things are changing with the Spurs. An era is ending. Tim Duncan is on the downhill side of his career, and now it appears Manu Ginobili is looking at a pretty short window of time in the NBA. That’s what he told an Argentinian news site, as translated by Hoopsworld. “The truth is that I…

The front line of the Spanish national team already had the Gasol brothers, and it just got better. Serge Ibaka — the Oklahoma City Thunder forward who was born in the Congo but played in Spain — has been granted Spanish citizenship and will play for the country in EuroBasket this summer, the event where…

The shackles are off Gilbert Arenas. He loves to tweet, but while he has an NBA contract he could get fined for putting up what he really was thinking — until the lockout. Now he can tweet whatever he wants without fear of reprisal. He was already a must follow before the shackles came off,…

What does it say about American sports fans that Kobe Bryant slipped out of the top spot in a poll of America’s favorite athletes and Derek Jeter replaced him on top of the list? That’s what happened in the annual Harris Poll of the most famous athletes in America (via the Orange County Register). What…

Bryan Colangelo has been calling the shots in Toronto and, well, that hasn’t gone as well as he planned. Now there is pressure on to win. Soon. As part of that President and GM Colangelo is looking to bring in a GM to be part of the Raptors front office, and he has several candidates…

The Lakers looked old and tired, getting swept by a Mavericks team that was actually older but showed more passion. Dallas was committed to executing their game plan in a way the Lakers no longer were. The Lakers need to rekindle that fire, they are counting on Mike Brown to do just that. But it…

Shaquille O’Neal has been through the wars. He’s won a lot of rings, he’s lost in finals, he’s been loved and scorned by the media. Oh, and he had his own reality show. Think what you want of him, he understands a lot of what it takes to get things done in the NBA. In…

It’s not much. At best it’s a meeting to set up a meeting. But it’s something. And right now we’ll take just about anything as a glimmer of hope. Staff from the league and the players union will meet Friday, according to Sports Illustrated. Mid-level staff members from the players’ association and league office are…

Today there are 114 more civilian casualties to the NBA lockout war… except the league says these are not casualties at all. We’re not buying that. So you can get the facts as presented, here are the key parts of the Associated Press report. The NBA has laid off about 114 people over the last…

Dwyane Wade is one of the best shot blocking guards in the NBA. Which makes him especially dangerous if his opponent is less than four feet tall. Not something he runs into much in the NBA (insert your own J.J. Barea joke here) but he does at his youth camp. So during a fun little…

Someday Mike Miller is going to be healthy. We think. He certainly is getting enough treatment for his many ailments. That now includes another surgery, this time to his left shoulder, according to Ira Winderman at the Sun-Sentinel. This is on the heels of the thumb surgery he already had after the NBA finals ended.…

Despite what David Stern seems to think is a franchise-crushing financial system, and despite the threat of a protracted lockout, NBA franchises seem to be selling for record prices. And healthy profits in some cases for the former owners. The latest is the just agreed-to deal for Joshua Harris to buy the Philadelphia 76ers. But…

Mickael Pietrus, the Phoenix Suns swingman, will not be playing for the French national team this summer as they try to qualify for the London 2012 Olympics. Instead, he’s going to have surgery. First the French national team announced that Pietrus essentially did not pass his physical with the team. Then his agent contacts BasketUSA,…

Minnesota is finally getting around to letting go of the coach who was 100 games below .500 in two seasons, and finding a new one. They are looking at some name veterans — Don Nelson and Rick Adelman — according to tweets from Marc Stein of ESPN. Sources say Wolves plan to talk to both…

When we last heard from Bismack Biyombo — the No. 7 overall pick now of the Charlotte Bobcats — he was going into a negotiating room with his Spanish team from last season, Fuenlabrada. The thing is, Fuenlabrada also has him under contract for the next two seasons and they want all of the $1.4…

The NBA league office apparently has nothing better to do during the lockout than monitoring team officials to make sure they don’t even have causal contact with players. Say just one wrong word and you can get threatened with a $1 million fine. So what was the deal with Mavs owner Mark Cuban standing with…

Orlando’s Jason Richardson is officially a free agent, you can tell because he has now said what every free agent is compelled by some law of nature to say. It’s not about the money, it’s about winning. It’s never about the money. Why would you even think that? Anyway, here is the quote, via the…

Will the players from any team be as happy to have a new coach as the Detroit Pistons? There was serious infighting between the coach and the players last season, including players skipping practices and more. Pistons forward Austin Daye doesn’t exactly say “don’t let the door hit you’re a– on the way out” but…

Nothing runs professional sports in the United States like television and television money. And it’s right in the middle of the NBA lockout. That starts with the current television deal, set to pay the league $930 million next season (assuming there is a next season). We told you before about how the NBA’s television networks…

Shaquille O’Neal and Charles Barkley at the same desk every Thursday night. First, that is appointment television. Second, TNT may want to increase its craft services budget (the people who cater food to the set). TNT made it official Thursday, announcing that Shaquille O’Neal will join the “Inside the NBA” show before and after games…